Mouse Time: Two Stories

by Rumer Godden

Offers two stories about mice, the first about a house mouse who befriends a lovely dove, and the second about a family of mice who adopt a young lady's jewelry box as their home

64 pages, Paperback

First published August 27, 1993

About the author

Margaret Rumer Godden was an English author of more than 60 fiction and non-fiction books. Nine of her works have been made into films, most notably Black Narcissus in 1947 and The River in 1951.
A few of her works were co-written with her elder sister, novelist Jon Godden, including Two Under the Indian Sun, a memoir of the Goddens' childhood in a region of India now part of Bangladesh.

Reviews

[Hilary · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are two short stories in this book. The first called Mouse House is a story of how some overcrowded house mice living in a flower pot in the cellar find a nicer place to live.

The second story The Mousewife is a sad tale of a Mousewife who is overworked with a lazy husband and many mouths to feed. She finds one day, the woman who owns the house has been given a turtle dove which has been trapped and is now put in a cage. The mousewife's husband grows jealous of her visiting the dove and bites her, eventually she sets the dove free Overall the second tale was gloomy and the afterword that explained these were tales written by Dorothy Wordsworth for her brother William were true but in the true tale the dove never escapes which made it even more sad.

The pictures are nice and I expect this book was intended as a beginner reader book but some aspects do date it.

[Barbara · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book contains two stories about mice which were originally published as separate books: Mouse House and The Mousewife.
Mouse House is the story of Bonnie, a very young mouse who frequently found herself squeezed out of the very crowded flowerpot where her family lived, and the new home which she found and was instrumental in providing for her family. The new home was a little dollhouse labelled Mouse House which was given to a girl called Mary as an Easter present. I have loved this story since I was a child.
The second story is The Mousewife, a tale of a very busy mother mouse with a fairly useless mate who makes friends with a caged turtle dove, which she ultimately manages to release back into the wild when a window is left open in the room containing the dove's cage. I hadn't read this story before.
Both stories are nicely illustrated with new illustrations by Martin Ursell.

[Margaret Pitcher · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved it, the writing is simple and, alongside Jane Pinkney’s gorgeous illustrations, luminous.

You feel the emotions of the imprisoned Dove and the caring, capable mousewife.

They are set in the children’s book world of yesteryear, but do not feel dated.

[Lyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sweet mouse stories for young listeners. I especially liked the one about the caged dove.